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THE OPENLNG OF A WORLD. 



For many years the star of empire cast its rays westward, 
until it reached the Golden Gate of the Pacific, where it 
reposed, and has been the beacon light of nations. But 
now it seems to be receiving a neAV impulse, and is turn- 
ing toward the Southern Cross. Governments, geographical 
societies, mercantile organizations, capitalists, and niission- 
ary associations are penetrating Africa in all her parts, and 
that vast continent is beginning to feel a new era. Christ- 
endom is becoming undeceived. A world is opening. 

GOVERNMENTAL ACTION. 

Heports have been made to the President of the French 
Republic by the leaders of the four expeditions dispatched 
to prospect for a railroad across the so-called Desert of 
Sahara and from the upper Senegal to Timbuctoo. That 
from St. Louis had met with armed opposition from the 
natives, but the others were comparatively successful in 
testing parallel lines as to their security and practicability. 
This year the Chambers further voted $300,000 to the Min- 
ister of Marine, to be expended in the erection of fortifi- 
cations in Medine, in surveys for a railway from the Sen- 
egal to the Niger, and for a cable from Isle de Saint to 
Cape Verd. 

The German Parliament appropriated $25,000 for Afri- 



I THE OPENING OF A WOELD. 

can research in its relations to commerce, and with this 
aid and private gifts the German Geographical Society has 
six different expeditions in Africa, led by Messrs. Biichner, 
Sentz, Rohlfs, Bohm, Pogge. and Flegel, respectively. 

Italy has taken her first installment of African territory 
by seizing the Bay of Assab, south of St. Paul de Loando, 
and she has sent mechanics and colonists there to form a 
settlement. The harbor is large, and can receive vessels 
of any tonnage. The Egyptian Government has ordered 
an official exploration of Soudan, both from a geograph- 
ical and an economical point of view. At the extreme 
south of the continent the English are pushing northward 
their arms and institutions, building up an empire. The 
occupation of Quittah and Porto Novo, on the west coast, 
is urged on the British Government, and Dahomey and 
Ashantee will soon become, it is believed, possessions of 
the same sagacious power. 

GEOGRAPHICAL EXPEDITIONS. 

The Geographical Society of Spain has sent Commander 
Sosten on a mission of discovery in eastern Africa. Two 
Portuguese expeditions are to start simultaneously from the 
Portuguese territories on the east and west coasts, w.hich 
are intended, after founding a series of commercial sta- 
tions, to meet in the interior. They will probably follow 
nearly the line of the Zambesi — the Mississippi of Africa. 
An Austrian party is to examine Kalakka, and another, led 
by Ilolub, is preparing to start from Cape Colony to pen- 
etrate to Zambesi and through Darfur. An Italian expedi- 
tion is exploring Abyssinia, and thence to Soudan. A Eus- 
sian party is journeying up the Nile. The British expedi- 
tion, commanded by Mr. J. Thomson, successor of the 



THE OPENING OF A WOULD. 6 

lamented Mr. Keith Johnson, has examuied the region 
north of lake Nyassa and south of lake Tanganyika. Count 
de Brazza is engaged in a second attempt to discover the 
sources of the Ogove. Captain Philipson Wybrants is 
leading an English expedition for the exploration of Um- 
zila's kingdom. 

Ardent expectations centre on the Congo country. Here 
Mr. H. M. Stanley, under the patronage of the International 
African Association, is conducting a generously-equipped 
party of some twenty Europeans and one hundred Africans. 
Part of his grand mission is the opening of a road ten feet 
wide on the north side of the Congo or Livingstone river, 
and the establishment of -rest-houses," supplied with goods, 
provisions, and medical stores for trade, travellers, and 
missionaries. This indefatigable explorer has founded the 
first civilizing station at Vivi. The next is to be at Stan- 
ley Pool, and two others are to be far inland. He is sur- 
mounting the gigantic difficulties in the way, and continues 
sanguine of his ability to ascend this mighty river to its 
source. 

Four other expeditions of the same association, of 
which the enlightened King of Belgium is president, are 
exploring Africa. One of these is proceeding from Zanzi- 
bar, forming stations and intending to join Mr. Stanley on 
the upper waters of the Congo, the whole to constitute a 
chain of commercial centres across the continent. 

It is an interesting and important fact that elephants, 
trained as transports, are performing their part well. There 
can no longer be any question that this new burden-bearer, 
which can carry about half a ton each, will be a very valu- 
able assistant in the march of civilization through the wilds 
of tropical Africa. 



THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 



COMMERCIAL ENDEAVORS. 



Many eyes are looking to Africa as the quarter from 
which relief may be most speedily expected for the languish- 
ing industries and idle capital of Europe. Mr. Donald Mac- 
kenzie is again at Cape Juby with a miscellaneous cargo by 
the steamer Corsair, from London, to open trading connec- 
tions inland. The Governor of Sierra Leone is arranging 
an expedition from Bathurst, by way of Sego, to Timbuc- 
too, prepared to conduct an extensive business on sound 
principles. Mr. Geoffrey, an experienced engineer, and 
Mr. Gillis, formerly a merchant at Cape Palmas and at 
Grand Bassam, have left Antwerp for the Congo to intro- 
duce a system of legitimate commerce. The formation is 
stated at Viele of an Anglo-Franco-Danish society to dis- 
patch caravans and commercial parties and to open farms 
and trading depots in the interior of Africa. A company 
in Paris has secured privileges in the forests and mines 
of the Zambesi section, which are said to be of immense 
value. A company has been formed at Zanzibar with the 
view of organizing a regular service of transport between 
the coast and the lakes Tanganyika and Victoria. The 
f^dciety is to guarantee the arrival at its destination of mer- 
chandise and baggage confided to its care. It has, more- 
over, taken steps to establish at Tabora a depot for mer- 
chandise, whence travellers can obtain supplies, and where 
payment will be made by letters of exchange either upon 
Zanzibar or upon some European banker previously ap- 
pointed. By the aid of the eight stations which will soon 
be established between Bagamoyo and Karema, a traveller 
will be able to reach the lakes with a light caravan in less 
than two months. 



THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 

STEAM LINES. 

A line of steamers belonging to Urich Durler & Co. is 
to commence running early in the year from Germany to 
the west coast of Africa. Messrs. A. C. Verminck & Co., 
long engaged in the trade, intend to put on several steam- 
ers between Marseilles and western Africa, the first ves- 
sel to leave in December. She is 1,200 tons register, and 
is named the Djolibah, in commemoration of the discovery 
of the sources of the Niger by Messrs. Zweisel and Mou- 
stier, at the direction and expense of Mr. Verminck. They 
describe this famous stream as rising about 100 miles back of 
Liberia, running thence northeast toward the desert ; turn- 
ing at length to the southeast, and again to the southwest, 
emptying into the sea more than 3,000 miles from where 
it began. 

A third line of steamers — the West African Steam Navi- 
gation Company — has been commenced between Liverpool 
and the west coast of Africa for freight and passenger 
accommodation. The African Steamship Company and 
the British and African Steam Navigation Company are 
jointly dispatching a monthly steamer direct from Ham- 
burg to western Africa. This is in addition to their week- 
ly steamer from Liverpool and Glasgow for Africa. The 
last-named company has just had built two steel steamers 
of 1,850 tons register each. The shallow depth of water on 
the bars of most of the west African rivers, always a seri- 
ous obstacle, will be thus measurably overcome by the light- 
ness of steel over iron. Steel is now considered the most 
perfect material for ship-building, as well as the cheapest 
in the long run. If so, it is surely destined to make a rev- 
olution in the ocean marine and war fleets of the world, 
German merchants are extending their connections along 



6 THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 

the northern African coast, and a line of steamers is pro- 
jected between Morocco and Bremen. Increased commu- 
nication has been provided between Algeria and Marseilles. 
A royal mail steamer leaves Lisbon the 5th of every month, 
and, touching at various places on the way, makes the pas- 
sage to Angola and Benguela in about thirty-five days. 

Steamers are running on the rivers Senegal, Gambia, 
St. Paul's, Niger, Gaboon, Ogove, Coanza, and the Zam- 
besi and its tributary, the Shire, ^nd on the lakes Victoria- 
Nyanza, Tanganyika, and Nyassa, mostly in the prosecution 
of trade. 

GOLD anNING. 

Five organizations are operating in the Wassaw country. 
These are the Effuenta Gold j\Iine Company, the Swanzey 
Company, the Gold Coast Mining Company, and the Aboso 
Gold Mining Company (English), and the African Gold 
Coast Company (French). The latter named is the pio- 
neer mover, having only began in August, 1878, to drive 
three tunnels or drifts, yet they now report "between one 
and two thousand tons of ore extracted, worth £5 4s. per 
ton, and are in a condition to extract some forty tons per day 
of much richer ore, with an almost certainty of an output 
of a hundred tons a day at the end of another year." A 
commissioner has been appointed to reside at Tacquah, 
with a salary of f3,000 per annum, thus giving assm-ance 
that British law and security will be afforded capital and 
labor in mining operations. 

RAILROADS. 

The West Africa Light Railways Company of London 
propose the building of four railroads in the Yoruba coun- 
try, viz. : From Salt Pond to ■ Mackessim, twenty miles ; 



THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 7 

Accra to the river Yolta. fifty miles ; Chamah or Dix Cove 
to the Wassaw gold mines, fifty miles ; and from Gaiin, 
opposite Lagos, to Abbeokuta, reputed to have a popula- 
tion of 125,000, forty miles. 

It is humiliating, perhaps, to Americans that an English 
company has received a charter from Liberia for a railroad 
extending two hundred miles back from Monrovia, and 
designed ultimately to connect that port with the head- 
waters of the Niger. This is a shorter and more feasible 
route than that contemplated by the French by way of the 
Senegal, and is attracting considerable interest in Europe. 

Six diiferent railroads — short ones, of course — are par- 
tially completed in South Africa. A railroad from Zanzibar 
to the Victoria-Nyanza lake is popularly advocated in Eng- 
land. The Portuguese propose communication with lake 
Nyassa and the east coast by steamers on the easily naviga- 
ble part of the Zambesi and its tributaries, and obviating 
the difficulties of the impeded points by railways. 

TELEGRAPHS. 

Telegraphic communication is now complete between 
London and the Cape of Good Hope. A project for con- 
structing an electric line from end to end of Africa has the 
sanction of the African Exploration Committee of the Royal 
Geographical Society of England. A report made to that 
society on the subject speaks in sanguine terms of its feasi- 
bility, with particulars of probable cost and revenue. The 
route is thus described : " The Egyptian Government, at one 
end, is prepared to carry forward its line, which already 
extends southward some distance beyond Khartoum, as far 
as Gondokoro. At the other end the Government of Cape 
Colony is expected to extend the existing line in British 
south Africa to Pretoria, in the Transvaal. It is now pro- 



8 THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 

posed to continue the line from the southern limits of 
P]gyptian territory to Mtesa's capital, and thence round the 
western shore of the Victoria-Nyanza, and on to Unyam- 
yembe ; from thence to branch out westward to Ujiji and 
eastward to Mpwapwa, Bagamoyo, and Zanzibar ; from 
Bagamoyo to conduct the wires in a southwesterly direction 
to the head of lake Nyassa, Avhere they would be carried to 
Livingstonia, and down the Shire and Zambesi, and thence 
southward to Pretoria. The whole distance from Khartoum 
to Pretoria is 3,335 geographical miles, or allowing for de- 
viations, just 4,000 miles." This is claimed to be no more 
difficult than was similar work accomplished in Australia 
and India. 

COAL, IRON, AND DIAMONDS. 

According to an official geological report upon the Free 
State of the Orange River, immense beds of coal and iron 
exist in that district. The iron presents three parallel 
strata, separated by grit, which will furnish millions of 
tons, and it lies in conditions peculiarly favorable for work- 
ing, as it is only a few miles from a coal-bed. The South 
African mines yielded diamonds in 1879 of the estimated 
value of $18,000,000, a slight increase over the product of 
the previous year. 

NEW PUBLICATIONS. 

The African Times, devoted to African development, is 
a paper issued at London. L'Afrifpie is a magazine pub- 
lished at Greneva in the interest of African exploration. 
The existence of such enterprises, wholly devoted to one 
country, is evidence of the present importance attaching 
to Africa. No little of the information herein presented 
is derived from these faithful and valuable monthlies. 



THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 9 

MISSIONARY EFFORTS. 

To the Christian, Africa is one of the most interesting- 
portions of the globe. Efforts to penetrate it with the light 
of the (xospel evince an enthusiasm and a consecration of 
talent and life worthy of the spacious field to be illumi- 
nated. Though the bright prospects attending the early 
history of the Church Missionary Society of England mis- 
sion in Uganda have not been realised, and after three 
years' work there is a seemingly unanimous rejection of 
Christianity by Mtesa and his people, still a number of 
missionaries remain, and others are on their way, the latter 
accompanied by three Uganda envoys on their return from 
London. The tidings from the stations of the same society, 
and from those of the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, 
Durham, and Dublin, on the island of Zanzibar, and at 
Magilla and Macasi on the mainland, tell of steady prog- 
ress. The London Missionary Society has not only rein- 
forced its flourishing mission on lake Tanganyika, but 
commenced a station on its western shore. The Free 
Church of Scotland jNIissionary Society has opened another 
station at Zomba. The French Evangelical Society is to 
push forward a mission from that at Victoria Falls into the 
Barotse valley. "The Congo Inland Mission" is an un- 
denominational organization in England, whose fourteen 
representatives have accompanied or joined Mr. Stanley, 
and are establishing stations under the protection of the 
enterprise with which he is intrusted. 

Robert Arthington, Esq., continues his liberality by offer- 
ing the London Missionary Society $15,000 for the building 
and equipping of a missionary steamer to be placed on lake 
Tanganyika, and to the English Baptist Missionary Society 
$20,000 toward putting on and maintaining a missionary 



10 THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 

steamer on the Congo above the cataracts. It is to be 
launched at Stanley Pool, which the readers of " The Dark 
Continent" will remember is situated in the midst of a 
fertile and populous country. 

The Church Missionary Society has the steamer Henry 
Venn employed in missionary service on the Niger and 
its branches by Bishop Crowther and clergy. The Central 
African Company of Edinburgh has placed the steamer 
Lake Nyassa on the lower Zambesi and its Shire feeder 
from lake Nyassa ; while the Free Church of Scotland 
Missionary Society has floated the steamer Italia on the 
upper Shire, above the cataracts, and on the lake itself, 
and it has also made a road sixty miles long around the 
Shire cataracts, bringing the head of lake Nyassa, by the 
Suez Canal route, within sixty days' travel of Great Britain. 

The receipt of a very large legacy has stimulated and 
enabled the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign 
Missions to undertake the establishment of a mission at 
Bihe, a populous town near the sources of the Coanza, and 
to extend the Zulu mission into Umzila's kingdom, on the 
southeastern coast, near Delagoa Bay. The American Mis- 
sionary Association is preparing for the commencement of 
a mission in the Nile basin, near the junction of the Sobat 
with the Nile, making Khartoum the base of supplies. 

THE A3IERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY 

appeals for wider and more favorable recognition and sup- 
port than it has hitherto received. The planting and suc- 
cess of Liberia illustrate the character and worth of its 
labors and vindicate its claims upon the sympathy and 
benevolence of the patriot, philanthropist, and Christian. 
With the increased inberest now felt in the settlement and 



THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 11 

Christianization of Africa, tliere is every reason to hope that 
the beginnings made in the young African republic may 
lead more rapidly than ever to gi-eat and blessed results. 

THE APPOINTED AGENTS. 

The occupation of western and equatorial Africa by whites 
cannot proceed fast, if at all, the climate being too peril- 
ous to attract large numbers of them. The list of dead 
and missing among recent explorers, traders, miners, and 
missionaries but confirms the sad experience of previous 
attempts to open and elevate the continent. " Out of 117 
missionaries," wrote a faithful laborer on the ground, '' sent 
by the Wesleyan Missionary Society during forty years, 54 
died on the field, 39 of them within one year of their ar- 
rival ; and of those who survived 13 were obliged to return 
after a residence of from six to twenty months." In thirty 
years the English Church Missionary Society sent 109 mis- 
sionaries, half of whom were removed by death at their 
posts, 4 on their way home, and 14 returned with impaired 
constitutions. Forty-one missionaries of the Basle Mission- 
ary Society died at their stations in the course of a few 
years. From 1836 to 1851, 31 persons who had taken part 
in the American Episcopal mission were obliged to relin- 
quish their labors. The celebrated Niger expedition, or- 
ganized and equipped with the zealous co-operation of 
Prince Albert, lost by death in the few months of its explo- 
ration of that river 40 of the 145 whites which composed 
the officers and crew, while among the 158 blacks engaged 
not one died ! 

PKEPARING TO GO. 

It is a significant coincidence that, with the general eff'orts 
for the development of Africa, there should come among 



12 THE OPENIKG^ OF A WORLD. 

the Negroes of the United States unrest — an exodus — a 
longing for a permanent home and aspirations for nation- 
ality. Inquiry proves that there is scarcely an institution 
for the higher education of colored young men that has 
not several students who have chosen Africa as their coveted 
field of labor. The colored Baptists of Virginia are sup- 
porting one of their race in the Yoruba country, and the 
colored Baptists of South Carolina raised $1,007 in the 
year ending March last towards the salary of their (colored) 
missionary in Liberia. At the last General Conference of 
the African Methodist Episcopal Church $25,000 was ap- 
propriated for missionary work in Africa, and Bishop Tur- 
ner has since been appointed to proceed to Liberia and to 
organize efforts for the propagation of the Grospel in that 
republic. He states that " already four ministers and two 
female teachers have volunteered to go, and are only await- 
ing the means of transportation and support." Communi- 
cations received by the American Colonization Society 
demonstrate that some 500,000 people of color are consid- 
ering the question of removal to Liberia. 

OUIl ADVANTAGES. 

America has superior advantages over all Europe for 
colonizing, civilizing, and evangelizing Africa and control- 
ing its valuable commerce. It has Liberia, the only daugh- 
ter republic, with about 1,000,000 of settlers and natives, 
holding some 600 miles of the best part of the west coast ; 
and about 5,000,000 of colored people at home, many of 
the latter of whom, enterprising farmers and mechanics, 
and teachers and ministers, would make homes in " Father- 
land" if cheap and rapid passage thither were provid- 
ed. Their presence would create no surprise or hostil- 



THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 13 

ity among their kin. They could keep communication 
open, and gradually train the aborigines in habits of en- 
lightened and systematic industry. They could readily 
penetrate the vast interior, exchanging foreign goods and 
manufactures for local products, Avhich are everywhere in 
demand. They could extend a line of railroad and a chain 
of Christian schools and churches, with civilized farms and 
settlements, from the malarious sea-board across the beau- 
tiful, populous, and salubrious highlands, to the banks of 
the Niger and on to the very heart of Soudan, growing 
stronger and stronger in the confidence of a noble destiny 
in the land of their ancestors. 

SUPERlOIl AFPwICANS. 

Many of the inland tribes of western Africa are of manly 
character and comparative advancement in certain useful 
arts. Prof. Edward W. Blyden, D. D., LL. D., himself a 
Negro, writes : " I have carefully studied the African char- 
acter, and can speak advisedly of its worth. I have seen 
him under Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, Scandinavian, and Semetic 
rule. I have lived in the United States, in the West Indies, 
and in Venezuela. I have travelled in Syria, Egypt, and in 
the interior of Africa, and I testify that the manhood of 
the race is in the heart of Africa — the basis upon which 
the African national superstructure is to be erected. When 
in the interior of Africa I have met men, both Pagan and 
iMohannnedan, to whom, as well from their physical as their 
mental characteristics, one voluntarily and instinctively 
feels like doing reverence." 

AN AFPaCAN STATE NEEDED. 

It will doubtless be observed that nearly all the attempts 
to penetrate Africa have been from its eastern side. For 



14 THE OPENING OF A WORLD. 

the United States the indications point to the duty and pol- 
icy of entering from the western coast, so as to reach the 
most intelligent population of the continent, and especially 
those from whom large numbers of Africo-Americans came 
as slaves, and to occupy the most fertile and desirable lands 
in all Africa. Let a renewed and determined effort be 
made to strengthen Liberia — the open gateway to the 
wealthy interior. 

The spirit of progi'ess has shown itself strongly in that 
republic, and by projects for extending coffee-planting and 
introducing railroads into that important key to populous 
and opulent Soudan. The contemplated annexation on 
mutual and peaceful terms of the extensive and valuable 
territory adjoining its eastern frontier, known as the King- 
dom of Medina, demonstrates increasing strength and 
power. 

We have dreams of an interior State of Africans, start- 
ing from Boporo and going back, where the people v/ill 
live in the peace and quietness of a highly-civilized and 
pure Christian community, and, surrounded by a congenial 
population whom they can influence, grow and expand un- 
der the guidance of their race instincts into a useful and 
honorable State. The world needs such a State, and such 
a State it will have. 



[Editorial from The Sun, of Baltimore, November 27, ISSO.] 
THE DEVELOPMENT OF AFRICA. 



In our supplement to-day, uiuler the caption of "The Open- 
ing of <a Workl," will be found a veiy interestino; and exhaustive 
r6siun6 of the progress of recent African discovery, research, 
colonization, ami commerce. Tliis article has been canifuUy 
prepared by the Secretary of the American Colonization Society, 
at Washington, and many of the details given are now published 
for tlie first time. No man in the country is more competent to 
deal with this subject intelligently than Mr. Coppinger, who 
lias been connected with the Colonization Society for forty-three 
years, and has represented Liberia as Consul-General at Wash- 
ington for a quarter of a century. The commercial and man- 
ufacturing countries of Europe are pressing forward their expe- 
ditious into every part of Africa with intense vigor. It is the 
only continent wliich is free to occupancy and conquest by the 
powers of civilization, and it is so rich in every species of prod- 
uct, not omitting men, that it cainiot fail to excite the avidity 
of every ambitious government. The United States has a deep 
and peculiar interest in Africa. The Repnblic of Liberia is the 
one foreign colony sent out from our loins. It was founded and 
has been protected and encouraged by the United States, as 
affording a gateway through which our emancipated slaves could 
be restored to the continent from which their ancestors were 
stolen away. 

The republic which we have set up on the west coast of Africa 
is growing steadily, and nothing but its poverty and the defi- 
ciency of its foreign and internal communications prevent it 
from developing more rapidly. Its population is already a mill- 
ion in number, including the tribes under its control; it has 



16 THE DEVELOPMENT OF AFRICA, 

six liuiulrod miles of coast line, and a veiy little ileeper penetra- 
tion into the continent will bring its frontiers over the coast 
range of mountains and to the Niger river. Once there, it will 
be easy to open communication Avith the lieart of the Soudan. 
An English company is about to build a railroad in Liberia, and 
the country is so rich in every sort of tropical product, including 
cotton, tobacco, sugar, and the best and richest coffee, that a 
very little development is all that is needed to convert its re- 
sources into wealth. The mere fact that there are half a million 
colored people in this country now seeking a way to emigrate to 
Liberia should suffice to make the United States eagerly watch- 
ful of European designs upon Africa. If these 500,000 colored 
people could be successfully transplanted into Liberia, American 
trade would secure a foothold in Africa whicli could not he 
shaken; and v,-hen once the tide of emigration successfully sets 
that way, it will not be earl}- checked. 



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